Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE NOMADES, by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: What nature makes in any mood Last Line: Picks presents for the christening-day. | ||||||||
WHAT Nature makes in any mood To me is warranted for good, Though long before I learned to see She did not set us moral theses, And scorned to have her sweet caprices Strait-waistcoated in you or me. I, who take root and firmly cling, Thought fixedness the only thing; Why Nature made the butterflies, (Those dreams of wings that float and hover At noon the slumberous poppies over,) Was something hidden from mine eyes, Till once, upon a rock's brown bosom, Bright as a thorny cactus-blossom, I saw a butterfly at rest; Then first of both I felt the beauty; The airy whim, the grim-set duty, Each from the other took its best. Clearer it grew than winter sky That Nature still had reasons why; And, shifting sudden as a breeze, My fancy found no satisfaction, No antithetic sweet attraction, So great as in the Nomades. Scythians, with Nature not at strife, Light Arabs of our complex life, They build no houses, plant no mills To utilize Time's sliding river, Content that it flow waste forever, If they, like it, may have their wills. An hour they pitch their shifting tents In thoughts, in feelings, and events; Beneath the palm-trees, on the grass, They sing, they dance, make love, and chatter, Vex the grim temples with their clatter, And make Truth's fount their looking-glass. A picnic life; from love to love, From faith to faith they lightly move, And yet, hard-eyed philosopher, The flightiest maid that ever hovered To me your thought-webs fine discovered, No lens to see them through like her. So witchingly her finger-tips To Wisdom, as away she trips, She kisses, waves such sweet farewells To Duty, as she laughs "To-morrow!" That both from that mad contrast borrow A perfectness found nowhere else. The beach-bird on its pearly verge Follows and flies the whispering surge, While, in his tent, the rock-stayed shell Awaits the flood's star-timed vibrations, And both, the flutter and the patience, The sauntering poet loves them well. Fulfil so much of God's decree As works its problem out in thee, Nor dream that in thy breast alone The conscience of the changeful seasons, The Will that in the planets reasons With space-wide logic, has its throne. Thy virtue makes not vice of mine, Unlike, but none the less divine; Thy toil adorns, not chides, my play; Nature of sameness is so chary, With such wild whim the freakish fairy Picks presents for the christening-day. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...AN INTERVIEW WITH MILES STANDISH by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL AUF WIEDERSEHEN! SUMMER by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL AUSPEX by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL BEAVER BROOK by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL COMMEMORATION ODE READ AT HARVARD UNIVERSITY by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL IN A COPY OF OMAR KHAYYAM by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL IN THE TWILIGHT by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL LINES; SUGGESTED BY GRAVES TWO ENGLISH SOLDIERS ON CONCORD by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL MY LOVE by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL ON BOARD THE '76; WRITTEN FOR BRYANT'S SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY by JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL |
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